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 |   A blog to house my musings, curiosities, and fascinations. |
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When it came time for me to start blogging again, I found myself paralyzed. I was trapped by the belief that my blog had to be unique, that it had to have a defined theme, and that it had to be appealing to everyone. After some time scouring Google for advice, I realized that if all I did was worry and plan, I would spend forever worrying and planning and never get to writing. From that realization, I've decided to display my blog writing guidelines here for everyone to see, but especially for me to see when I come here to write. ~1~ Blog about what is appealing to YOU. Don't worry about anyone else. ~2~ Allow yourself to WRITE! Don't restrain yourself to one voice, one writing style, one genre, or one topic area. ~3~ Throw out the fear of maintaining a consistent theme. Blog about your passions, interests, fancies, inspirations, opinions, musings, curiosities, ramblings, and loves. ~4~ Explore, experiment, and have fun! So, this is my solution. A blog about anything and everything that sparks my interest.  The title is inspired by the quote at the bottom of this introduction. Everything you love, even for a short time, becomes part of you. Our experiences and perception of the world is colored by those things we love and have loved, whether those things are  or not. This blog will be a place to house those passions and curiosities. Please enjoy! "It came to me that every time I lose a dog they take a piece of my heart with them, and every new dog who comes into my life gifts me with a piece of their heart. If I live long enough, all the components of my heart will be dog, and I will become as generous and loving as they are." -Anonymous ![Merit Badge in Aloha
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Only the most selfless, dedicated person would come up with an idea like an Aloha MB. But then, from all those things you do on WDC and we know you're doing out in the world, it's what we should have known you'd do. You've always been working to make things better and help people, animals, and places. Maybe the badge should have your picture so everyone knows a real example of Aloha.](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Aloha-2171989_14.gif) Cover image by Jessica Woulfe
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This is an interesting question that I don’t think I’ve ever considered. Perhaps because I have not yet experienced most of my life, the component of age hasn’t been much of a consideration. That said, I am beginning to mentally transition from a “young adult” to just a normal adult, so there are more responsibilities that I am now taking on. I think that’s where my mind is going with this entry, so let’s pursue it! Responsibilities change as we get older. Becoming an adult means more responsibilities related to finances, a home, a car, a career, children, aging parents/grandparents, and more. Our lives progressively become more and more about providing for other people over ourselves. You may take on the responsibility of loving someone else, loving an animal, working a job, caring for a home and children, which will leave less time for caring for yourself. I am a big proponent of self-care, whatever that means to you. I am an introvert, so self-care to me means curling up alone with music, my writing, a book, and the dog curled nearby. I need this time to keep myself sane, but as we age and take on more responsibility, the time available for self-care becomes more limited. However, I will say that as we age, we also build our support system. I mentioned intimate relationships, pets, and children as “responsibilities,” but they are also (of course) things we love and when the relationships are healthy, they help our mental state. Another side of this though is that as we’ve grown up, we’ve also learned how to deal with more things because we’ve experienced more things. We understand that life has high points and low points, but the train will keep moving so long as we don’t jump off and the view is bound to change around the next bend. We have a longer history to compare our current hardships with. Young people, especially teenagers, get more agitated when confronted by something difficult because they do not have the life experience to see the end of the tunnel. This does affect their mental state, so in that way, age may alleviate some of those stressors, but then of course, others rise to take their place. So far, I’ve only talked about the transition from youth to adulthood (because this is my only experience so far), but on the other end of the spectrum, there is aging into middle age and eventually old age. There are a whole suite of new stressors associated with this aging in our latter years including fears of retirement, an aging body, the compounded stresses of your children’s lives, and eminent death. I apologize for the “all over the place” entry. I think this topic itself is “all over the place” because there are so many different angles it could be discussed from. The stresses through our lives change, and thus our mental state is affected differently throughout our aging. People deal with different stresses differently, so where someone’s mental health may be more affected by the stresses in youth, another may be more affected by the stresses that accompany old age. Our path through life is never exactly the same as anyone else’s, so I think the answer of whether age affects mental health will depend on the person. |
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It's based on a mathmatics text and I could rework it into something experimental. Then I took on Cupid... 
